inksketch

Paint.NET Ink Sketch Effect

I'm still learning how to create complex effect filters for Paint.NET. I think this is one of my best yet.

The Idea

I thought that it would be easy to automate the steps that I had come up with for turning a picture into an ink sketch with colored pencil shading. It turned out that it wasn't too hard. Rick Brewster was nice enough to send me the source code to the Pencil Sketch effect from Paint.NET 3.05. From that, I learned how to combine preexisting effects and blending operations.

NOTE:Rick has bundled this effect with Paint.NET version 3.10 and beyond. If you have upgraded your Paint.NET to 3.10 or higher, there is no need to download this effect DLL--you already have it!

Source Code

Here are the simplified steps that my code simulates:

1. Open an image 2. Duplicate the layer 3. Effects > Glow the bottom layer with radius 6 (default) and both other sliders tied together based on my Coloring slider 4. Run the Toon effect on the top layer 5. On the top layer, Adjustments > Black and White 6. Then, Adjustments > Brightness / Contrast... set the contrast to 100% and adjust the brightness based on my Ink Outline slider 7. Change the blending mode of the top layer to Darken